


Retirement on a Hero's Budget

by lar_laughs



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Clint retires, Community: be_compromised, F/M, firemen are heroes, rocky mountains as backdrop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-29
Updated: 2013-07-29
Packaged: 2017-12-21 17:13:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/902818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lar_laughs/pseuds/lar_laughs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint falls off one building too many and the doctors tell him he needs to hang up the leather and lycra. What's a superhero to do? He decides to retire to the Rocky Mountains where he goes into something safer... like fighting wildfires.</p><p>But sometimes the heroes in leather and lycra still need help.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Retirement on a Hero's Budget

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SugarFey](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SugarFey/gifts).



> Written for the Be_Compromised 2013 promptathon, using the prompt:  
>  _Clint and Natasha have retired from active duty. Maybe they have desk jobs, maybe they run a bar frequented by agents, maybe they've been hired by the private sector or they do another job entirely._
> 
>  
> 
> _Then the world is threatened._
> 
>  
> 
> _Suddenly Steve and Tony* are at their door, asking if they want to suit up with the Avengers once more._
> 
>  
> 
> *I substituted Bruce. For reasons.

There hasn’t been a plume of smoke in the skies overhead in nearly seven days. A record for a fire season that’s started out this dry and the sort of thing that makes the surrounding towns happy. Too bad it makes for cranky fire teams. The big one is coming. Clint can feel it in his bones.

It’s a wonder Natasha hasn’t been in here complaining about not having anything to do. And by _do_ , she means fight. And by _anything_ , she means fires. She’s taken to fighting fires like a duck takes to water... if a duck enjoys carrying a fifty pound pack up and down a mountain in a hundred degree weather. The only problem about Natasha liking to fight fires is that she doesn’t like waiting around for them. In their old life, there was always a crime being committed. It was just a matter of finding it.

Fire is different. It’s deceptive and vindictive and oh, so patient. A lightning strike up one of these mountains could burn down all the trees in a matter of hours or it might take it days. The flames might leap up into the air for all to see or smolder under a bed of dead needles. Sometimes, it can be fought with water from one man's hose; other times it needs retardant spewed from a helicopter.

Clint loves the challenge of figuring out what kind of beast they're up against. He loves the charts and maps and incomplete data that he's always having to sift through. It's just like staking out a target when he's shooting a bow. The better his information, the better his shot.

“Why Idaho?” Pepper had asked, the only one of the group to finally voice something that sounded like opposition to the plan. They’d only known that he was going into an alternate line of work, not that he was considering this a retirement. “We’ve got a fire crew here in the building. There’re fire crews all over the city. The state, even. You could be-”

But he’d only shook his head. “They’ve got mountains there. It’s hard to fall off a mountain."

“Not that hard,” Tony mumbled, clearly in the midst of a Stark-level pout about the whole thing. “Climbers do it all the time.”

Clint was tired of falling off buildings. Time was marching on and, no matter how far technology had come, no one had yet to dream up soft asphalt. That last fall had been bad. The kind of bad that he almost hadn’t woken up from. The doctor had come to see him while he was hooked up to more machines than even he could count, full of big words and long, drawn out explanations about why he needed to think about retirement. Natasha had finally walked out of the room in the middle of the man’s assessment. He’d been surprised to see her again that same day, thinking she’d finally had her fill of his increasing medical needs.

“We’ve got choices to make.”

“I’ve got choices to make, Tash. You’ve got a world to continue saving.”

She’d walked out on him again, during the middle of that conversation and several of the next few. They had differing opinions of what his retirement would look like and who would know. If he’d had his way, he would have walked into the sunset, never to be heard from again. Like an old Indian, he’d told her. The kind he read about in those horrible Westerns when he was a kid. There was always a stoic, old Indian who gave good advice and then, when he got too old to do any more good, he walked out into the desert. Very chain of life.

Natasha thought it was crap and told him so, many times. He wasn’t even sure who came up with the idea of fighting fires but he’d latched onto it quick enough. “Not buildings, though,” he’d told her early on in the discussion. “Buildings can be rebuilt. It’s the old growth trees up in the mountains that need to be protected. We owe it to the next generation of kids to leave them some public lands where they can see what a tree is. Maybe even a wildflower or two.”

He’d thrown a dart at a map. It landed right where he wanted it to, though. His only question had been at what point in the interior of the Rocky Mountains they would set up their new life. As soon as Natasha realized how seasonal this new work was, she pushed for winters to be spent in a location with a few more buildings. This place is starting to get under her skin, as evidenced by the fact that they only spent a month in Milan before coming back here for Christmas.

It’s a good life and one that Clint can still enjoy for many years to come. He’s fought his share of fires on the ground but he still feels useful even if he’s on a radio at base camp. Even in what he considers retirement, he’s still in better shape than some of the kids coming out of college. Natasha is leader of the pack, the hottest hot shot in the West.

Seven days is still a record between strikes. It’s bound to happen soon. He can feel the chaos rising up in his bones, waiting to strike.

He just didn’t figure the chaos would come in the form of Steve Rogers and Bruce Banner on his doorstep. “Howdy, strangers,” he drawls, wishing he could slam the door on them.

“Howdy, yourself.” Bruce pushes his way in, the fingers of his right hand nervously running over the crease of his trousers. The left hand is in his pocket, probably playing with the change he keeps there just so he has something to fiddle with. On a scale of one to “oh, shit, we’re all going to die”, he gives it a seven purely based on how amped up Bruce is. 

Steve waits to be invited in but he’s got worry lines on his forehead. Even still, he tries some small talk until Bruce cuts him off with a glare. “We need your help,” Steve says in his best Captain America voice.

“My bow only comes out during fair week and no one makes me gadgety arrows any more. I’m no help to you guys. I’m no hero.”

It’s bad enough when Bruce is fidgeting but calm Bruce is even worse. In an instant, he stops moving completely. Every part of him is zeroed in on Clint so that when he says, in the deceptively calm voice that no one could fail to understand, “We don’t need heroes. We need you.”

Steve’s hand on Bruce’s shoulder seems to calm him down from the next level, the likes of which Clint never wants to see. Instead, he gets another dose of Captain America. “I don’t know if you’ve heard about the mess in Alaska but-”

“The mess? You mean the fires up there? The whole state’s burning but no one seems to care because it’s all just public lands. Not enough people and structures to raise up a cry. We’ve sent a few crews up there. Why’ve they called you in?”

Bruce looks at Steve. Steve looks at Bruce. Clint tries to figure out why his blood has turned to ice in his veins.

“It’s more than just a fire. We’ve been able to keep it under wraps for the time being but it’s going to get out. Once the media hears about this, the Alaska fires will be front page news. The problem is, if we don’t stop this, it’s going to spread until all of North America is in flames.”

“What? Is there a fire bug on the loose? Some guy getting his jollies by setting trees on fire?”

“Not... exactly,” Steve says just as Bruce says, “Exactly.”

“Which is it?” he asks, impatient to get this over and done with so he can go back to his new normal.

“Fire bugs are the cause. Actual bugs, though. They feed off the energy the fire creates. Look, Tony can give you the run down when we get in the air. Right now, we need your knowledge of fire to help us out.”

Clint only shakes his head. “You want knowledge of fire? Get someone like Johnny Storm in on it. Kid loves stuff like this.”

“He’s already there, chasing the fire on the ground. What we need is someone who can predict where they might strike next or how the fire might move. We need Clint Barton, fire guy. He’s the hero we need on this.”

Steve’s earnest grin is enough to get him contemplating who he needs to call before he just walks out of his office. “I’ll need to call Natasha and see when she can get back. I’m not leaving without her.”

“Didn’t figure you would.” Now Steve’s grin is a full-blown smile. It might even be filled with what some people might call glee. “That’s why we went to her first. She’s already in the quinjet. You don’t think Bruce came off the plane like this, do you?”

Clint laughs. This is going to be just like old times.


End file.
